Making Agricultural Learning Accessible

Abstract

Worldwide women play an important role in agriculture but they still are marginalized in extension education programs. Traditionally, male-dominated extension services may contribute to gender bias in terms of access to information, participation, implementation and innovation. Limitations women face in accessing extension programs are related to social and cultural constructions. Recently, mobile phone technology has facilitated the work of extension agents and has provided participants new resources to improve their yields; nevertheless, farmer productivity in Mozambique varies between genders. This paper illustrates how agricultural messages designed as animations, and delivered via smartphones result in learning for farmers better than traditional extension presentations. This chapter focuses on the creation of educational materials by Scientific Animations Without Borders (SAWBO), and then illuminates the gaps and solutions related to gender agricultural learning. Lastly, a case study of Mozambican gender agricultural learning using animations is presented.